TRANSCRIBED FROM THE SOLIPHONE NOVEMBER 7, 1918 P. 5
Have been up on the front for the past month and was slightly gassed with blue cross gas a few days ago. I was sent to the hospital a few days ago. Am feeling pretty good now and expect to be back in action soon.
Believe me, the Yanks gave the Huns a merry chase in the St. Mihiel drive and also in the Argonne forest where they are still at it, hot on the trail.
I have been over the top twice, and let me tell you it isn't like reading it in a book or seeing it in pictures.
The trenches we ran the Huns out of were some fixed up. They even had little gardens and "baby" parks, and the dugouts had running water, electric lights, pictures and mirrors. It was more like a summer resort. They also had plenty of machine gun nests, but they were bad compared to their artillery and the gas shells they shot at us.
It's funny to watch our boys go crawling along like turtles in their tin hats and go to digging themselves holes to keep from being hit by the bursting shrapnel.
I am in the bombing section of my company and it's fun to watch those Boches come pouring out when we throw in bombs and hand grenades. They sure are dirty fighters. They will shoot until their shells are out or until we begin to get close to them, then they run out, throw up their hands and yell "Kamerad!"
I saw my first American girl in France here in the hospital and she was a welcome sight.
Please send on some letters--and more letters--and don't worry a minute about me. I am all right and I have been through the biggest drive and there won't be many more like it now.
NOTES: This letter was written by Orion Freeman from Paragould, Arkansas to his mother Mrs. J. F. Freeman. Freeman was born on October 11, 1894 in Paragould. He departed from New York on July 12, 1918 onboard the Olympic. He was a Private serving in Co. K, 346th Infantry. He returned to the US onboard the Siboney departing from St. Nazaire, France on March 22, 1919.
TRANSCRIBD BY LAEL HARROD
Have been up on the front for the past month and was slightly gassed with blue cross gas a few days ago. I was sent to the hospital a few days ago. Am feeling pretty good now and expect to be back in action soon.
Believe me, the Yanks gave the Huns a merry chase in the St. Mihiel drive and also in the Argonne forest where they are still at it, hot on the trail.
I have been over the top twice, and let me tell you it isn't like reading it in a book or seeing it in pictures.
The trenches we ran the Huns out of were some fixed up. They even had little gardens and "baby" parks, and the dugouts had running water, electric lights, pictures and mirrors. It was more like a summer resort. They also had plenty of machine gun nests, but they were bad compared to their artillery and the gas shells they shot at us.
It's funny to watch our boys go crawling along like turtles in their tin hats and go to digging themselves holes to keep from being hit by the bursting shrapnel.
I am in the bombing section of my company and it's fun to watch those Boches come pouring out when we throw in bombs and hand grenades. They sure are dirty fighters. They will shoot until their shells are out or until we begin to get close to them, then they run out, throw up their hands and yell "Kamerad!"
I saw my first American girl in France here in the hospital and she was a welcome sight.
Please send on some letters--and more letters--and don't worry a minute about me. I am all right and I have been through the biggest drive and there won't be many more like it now.
NOTES: This letter was written by Orion Freeman from Paragould, Arkansas to his mother Mrs. J. F. Freeman. Freeman was born on October 11, 1894 in Paragould. He departed from New York on July 12, 1918 onboard the Olympic. He was a Private serving in Co. K, 346th Infantry. He returned to the US onboard the Siboney departing from St. Nazaire, France on March 22, 1919.
TRANSCRIBD BY LAEL HARROD